MamaWritesSpells

Where most of the work actually happens.

Nobody talks about the middle.

They talk about the grind — the late nights, the color-coded calendars, the caffeine-fueled optimism.
And they talk about the result — the launch, the win, the numbers that finally make the struggle look worth it.

But the space in between?
The part where you’ve already done the work and nothing has happened yet?

That part gets treated like a mistake.

It’s the weirdest stretch of time. Quiet, but not peaceful.
You’ve pulled the lever. Sent the email. Made the decision. Changed the habit.
And now there’s just… waiting.

No feedback. No fireworks. No reassurance that you didn’t misunderstand the assignment.

This is usually where people panic.
Or overcorrect.
Or decide they must not be doing enough, because surely effort should feel louder than this.

But effort doesn’t always make noise.
Sometimes it just rearranges things underground.

I’ve learned — slowly, reluctantly — that outcomes lag behind effort in ways that are deeply annoying and not at all optimized for modern brains. We want dashboards. We want confirmation. We want proof of life.

Instead, we get silence.
And that silence messes with people.

We start narrating it as failure.
As laziness.
As some personal flaw that hasn’t yet been exposed but definitely will be.

Here’s the uncomfortable truth:
Most meaningful work spends a long time looking unfinished.

Healing does.
Writing does.
Building trust does.
Changing direction does.

There’s a season where nothing is wrong — but nothing is visible either.

And culturally, we are terrible at honoring that.

We praise output. We reward urgency. We clap for results that can be screenshot and shared. The middle doesn’t photograph well. It doesn’t compress neatly into a before-and-after.

But it’s where alignment forms.
Where understanding settles.
Where effort stops being performative and starts becoming structural.

The middle asks a different kind of patience — not the motivational kind, but the grounded one. The kind that says, I’ve done what I can for today. I’ll let the rest breathe.

That’s not quitting.
That’s trust.

And trust is a skill, even if no one taught us how to practice it.

If you’re in that space right now — the quiet stretch where effort hasn’t turned into outcome yet — you’re not behind. You’re not failing. You’re not missing some secret step everyone else figured out.

You’re just in the part nobody posts about.

Which, inconveniently, is where most of the real work happens.

(Yeah. I know. Not the answer anyone wants. Still true.)